Damon Lee Fowler

Food * History * Words

Recipes and Stories

31 December 2024: Quietly Greeting a New Year with Grandkids and Gringo Tacos

December 31, 2024

Tags: New Year's Eve, New Year's Cooking, Tacos, Gringo Tacos, American Cooking, Southern Cooking, Beef Tacos

Our New Year's Eve "Gringo" Beef Tacos

If your idea of a good time is to meet the new year by drinking yourself into a stupor surrounded by a big drunken crowd of people doing the same, well, bless your heart: have at it. Frankly, the only thing I can think of that would be less fun is prepping for a colonoscopy. And the older I get, the less it appeals.

Ever since we bought our house in Petersburg, our tradition for meeting the new year has been to spend it with our two oldest grandchildren, eating tacos, watching favorite old Christmas movies, playing Scrabble, and toasting the new year Read More

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3 June 2021: Of Fish Tacos and Mrs. H

June 3, 2021

Tags: Classic Mexican Cooking, Classic American Cooking, Tacos, Fish Tacos, Dorothy Haase, Marie Rudisill

My Fish Tacos: Be Kind. The name is Fowler and they happen to be really tasty.

One of my early mentors and friends in food writing was the late Marie Rudisill, whom you may have known as the outrageously frank Fruitcake Lady on The Tonight Show. Her first and best advice was, "Don't change your phone number, sugar: Half the fun you're gonna have from this thing is the phone calls you'll get."

The trouble was—and is—that I chose a profession that imposes solitude for a reason. I'm not outgoing by nature. But she was right; the best compensation for being reluctantly pushed into the public eye is that rare, unexpected call or letter that comes out of nowhere and lifts the spirit just when you need it most.

Over the years, they've sparked many treasured friendships, but none has meant more than the one that bloomed over a duck. Read More

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Selected Works

Cookbooks

Ham: A SAVOR THE SOUTH Cookbook

A part of the University of North Carolina Press’s SAVOR THE SOUTH® series, Ham: A SAVOR THE SOUTH Cookbook contains 55 classic recipes for hams Southern and otherwise.

Essentials of Southern Cooking: Techniques & Flavors of a Classic American Cuisine

A collection of more than twenty-five years of writing about and teaching the history and techniques of the cooking of my native American South, the collection of cuisines that we loosely call Southern Cooking.

Savannah Chef's Table: Extraordinary Recipes from This Historic Southern City

A portrait of Savannah's growing restaurant scene in recipes and stories.

Classical Southern Cooking

A Celebration of the Cuisine of the Old South, hailed as a modern classic and Bible of Southern Foodways.

The Savannah Cookbook

A loving portrait of a proud old port city in recipes

Damon Lee Fowler's New Southern Kitchen

Classical Southern Cooking in today's kitchen

Damon Lee Fowler's New Southern Baking

Traditional Southern Baking for modern cooks

Beans, Greens, and Sweet Georgia Peaches

A sampling of the South's Cookery for the hundreds of regional fruits and vegetables.

Dining at Monticello

Seventy five recipes that were documented to have been used at Mr. Jefferson's Monticello during his lifetime, translated for use in a modern kitchen, with essays by the Foundation's curatorial staff.

Quick Links

John Carrington Photography

Web site for the food photographer for two of my cookbooks, Classical Southern Cooking and The Savannah Cookbook

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